Energy

A flagship report published by the leading representative body for the UK offshore oil and gas industry finds that the UK’s carbon emissions fell by an estimated 10.3 percent this year, as the economy contracted by 11.3 percent.

A consortium of offshore renewable energy and marine companies will lead a project to explore the viability of developing an offshore charging facility for vessels as part of the industry’s efforts to decarbonize its vessel operations.

GIEK’s mission is to promote Norwegian exports – and it is doing that big time in the offshore wind market both in Europe and further afield. Having reached around NOK 4bn in June, its latest NOK 3.6bn (GBP 300m) risk-sharing splash supports supply contracts for Norwegian companies Aibel and OHT Alfa Lift AS to the Dogger Bank mega-project in the North Sea.  

European international oil companies (IOCs) are leading the way in terms of progressing strategies for renewable power growth, ahead of US players that have not, so far, made the same switch.

Dogger Bank wind farm owners, Equinor and SSE, have announced financial close on the first two phases of the project, representing in aggregate the largest offshore wind project financing to date globally.

Saitec Engineering has been awarded with 2.4M€ funding by the European Commission "Blue Economy Window" call.

Ørsted announced its intention to develop South Korean offshore wind projects with a potential capacity of up to 1.6GW off the coast of Incheon City. The announcement was made at an event joined by National Assembly members, South Korea's Energy Agency, and key industry leaders with offshore wind track records in South Korea's supply chain.

Contracted by JDR Cables, a world-class provider of subsea technologies and services, the multi-purpose offshore vessel Olympic Commander equipped with a 28 metre-long Safeway Seagull type walk-to-work gangway system, has been deployed for the efficient transfer of people and goods during a maintenance campaign at the Sandbank Wind Farm in the German North Sea.

A new project being led by the National Oceanography Centre to develop a system to improve the efficiency of offshore renewable energy generation and help develop the Blue Economy has been awarded funding from Innovate UK’s Sustainable Innovation Fund.



RWE, one of the world’s leading renewable energy companies, has signed an agreement with Greencoat to sell a 49 % stake in the UK offshore wind farm Humber Gateway for a total cash consideration payable at completion being GBP 648 million.

The Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult has outlined its ambition to boost the wind turbine blade designs of the future with investment in a state-of-the-art prototype blade manufacturing facility.

Fugro has successfully completed a large site characterisation field program off the coast of Massachusetts for Mayflower Wind, a joint venture between Shell New Energies and Ocean Winds (the global offshore wind collaboration of Engie and EDP Renewables). The 6 month program involved comprehensive, high resolution Geo data acquisition within the project’s 520 km2 lease area and along the export cable routes. These data will support permitting, design and installation of the proposed wind farm, which could generate up to 800 MW of renewable energy for over half a million homes.

Fugro’s work on the project began in April and comprised four vessels and one aircraft to acquire Geo-data about the site’s water depth, seafloor morphology, seabed and sub-seabed geohazards, historical and archaeological resources, benthic habitats, and soil properties. In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, Fugro coordinated closely with client representatives, implementing new procedures to ensure the health and safety of Fugro staff and stakeholders throughout the field program. The strategies proved successful, with all required survey, geotechnical and environmental data collected on time and without incident. Laboratory testing, data integration and analysis are now underway to support the project’s construction and operation plans.

Mayflower Wind Technical Director, Michiel Bekker recognized Fugro for its contributions, noting the company’s achievement of ‘Goal Zero’ for no harm to people or the environment, all while managing the operational uncertainties caused by Covid-19. “Fugro has been a real partner to us and we commend the company for their hard work and professionalism on the geophysical, geotechnical, lidar, and benthic campaigns for Mayflower in 2020. These data are important to both permitting and engineering efforts and will help keep this important project on track to generate low-cost, clean energy to the state of Massachusetts by the mid-2020s.”